Chapter 18: Installing the Canopy Latch Hardware
Step 19: Installing the Canopy Latches
I bought all the pre-fab parts from Brock Manufacturing and made the rest of the parts as called for in the plans. The installation was pretty much straight forward. Because I widened my canopy, there isn't any ledge left to mount the aft C8 bracket. The canopy frame is almost flush with the inside of the top longeron. So I glassed in a bracket from 8-BID tapes. This modification is peculiar to my plane only, but it works great.
I did find that I had an interference problem between all the C8 brackets and the hooks. When the canopy was closed, the C8 brackets fell flush against the top of the hooks, but with a 1/4th inch gap between the canopy and the longerons. (You can see how this happens very clearly by studying the geometry in the drawings on Chapter 18, page 13.) So I routed out the flox pads on the underside of the canopy by about 1/4th inch. Now the canopy closes flush onto the longerons.
From the archives, I knew to make a gentle bend into the aft control rod (C6) so it more closely followed the upper longeron and to alleviate the rubbing through the hole in the seatback and shoulder brace.
People talk about how much a of a pain it is to get all three latches adjusted evenly. I had no problems at all. I installed the forward and mid latches first, adjusted them with the forward C6 control rod, then installed the aft latch and its C6 control rod and adjusted them to match the other two latches.